I concede defeat –the Dear Leader’s vociferous cheerleaders
were right. ‘Modi will create history,’ they said with conviction, and indeed
he just has. November 8th, 2016 will go down in the history of
modern India as Bad Governance Day. Alternatively, it can be called
DeModitisation Day. Ordinary citizens
will have a holiday, while BJP members will have to report to their party
headquarters for a seven-day workshop.

Day
1:
A 10,000 word essay-writing assignment. The topic: How Not to Make Modimental Blunders.

Refreshments will be served: Crow sandwiches for
non-vegetarians, and humble pie for vegetarians.

Day
2:
A book launch by any intelligent person who formerly worked for the BJP government.I’m hoping former RBI governor, Raghuram
Rajan, would have written his first tell all book by then. I assume the title
will be something along the lines of, ‘Thank God Those Idiots Sacked Me!’ or,
‘I Told Them Not to Do It!’

Refreshments will be served: Same as above for BJP
members. Raghuram Rajan will get a thick
wedge of gooey chocolate cake instead.

Day
3:
A workshop will be conducted by a former union minister who held both the Home
and Finance portfolios. He will probably beseech BJP members not to think of
new policies as all the big ones they have introduced as ‘audacious’ and
‘pathbreaking’ have turned out to be colossal blunders. He will state very
clearly that the reason why no other Indian government has thought of schemes
like that before is because the schemes are incredibly stupid. He will try not
to smirk as he reminds the audience that the only policies that have worked
since the BJP took over were former UPA policies that were renamed on the
grounds of numerology and/or megalomania.

Refreshments will be served: Same as above for BJP
members.The former union minister will
get idli-sambar instead.

Day
4:
A session called Modiplexes, conducted by psychiatrists who specialise in
persecution complexes.They will attempt
to calm senior BJP members and assure them that the public has no desire at all
to kill them, and besides they’re way too busy lining up for cash.

Refreshments will be served: Comfort food for all.

Day
5:
An image consultant will hold two sessions.

Session 1: ‘Men with 56” chests don’t cry’.

Session 2: ‘Stop
with the Chest-thumping! Do not confuse Guerrilla tactics with Gorilla tactics’.

Refreshments will be served: Bananas for all.

Day
6:
Documentaries of the urban and rural poor who suffered through the traumatic demonetisation
exercise will be screened. Private school teachers will monitor the auditorium
with cattle prods to ensure that the BJP members stay awake (we’ve seen them in
Parliament, we know!).

Refreshments will not be served.

Day
7:
A grand finale on a wildly extravagant Bollywood scale at the Ram Lila grounds
in Delhi. BJP members will be joined by ten thousand lucky people. These will
include Bollywood celebs like Anupam Kher and Ajay Devgn, certain journalists,
certain members of corporate India and heads of big business houses like Baba
Ramdev. They will have a 6 am to 6 pm yoga session where they will crouch, hold
their ears, and practise just one asana: murgasana. This fabulous event will be
beamed live across the nation.

Refreshments will be served: Only diuretic liquids.

Note:
Only one sulabh sauchalaya will be available. The crowd will have to queue to use it. There
will be no special queues for ladies or senior citizens. People are only
allowed to use the bathroom once during the entire day. Their right hand finger
will be marked with indelible ink.

Ladies-in-waiting

Posted on : June 10, 2016

Rupa Gulab

You want facts – I’ll give you facts! On March 5, 2014, BJP leader Nitin Gadkari said that if his party was voted to power at the Centre, it would try to abolish most of the direct and indirect taxes to generate more revenue and reduce inflation. Well, the BJP won that election and by now most of us know that all they have generated so far is hot air, photoshopped images, and doctored tapes (apart from divisive Hindutva sloganeering, lying shamelessly appears to be a big part of the party’s warped ideology too). Inflation has shot up and so have taxes. To add to our burden, the BJP has slapped the Swachh Bharat cess and Krishi Kalyan cess (it kicks in from June 2016) on service tax as well. To be fair to Nitin Gadkari and the rest of the BJP’s large number of bariatric surgery patients, it’s pretty obvious that ‘less is more’ is not part of the party’s philosophy. I do have a question for the Dear Leader though: why torture us with heavy taxation when all he has to do is tell his wealthy friends to add to India’s coffers with cash instead of giving him extravagant presents like ridiculous monogrammed suits and joy rides in their private jets? Hello, he said ‘India First,’ didn’t he?
So yes, perhaps it’s a good thing that two powerful ladies who generously dish out freebies in the name of social welfare have retained their seats as Chief Ministers of Tamil Nadu and West Bengal. Here’s to J Jayalalithaa aka Amma and Mamata Banerjee aka Didi – two big cheers, please! So what if we have no idea where they’re getting the money to give marginalised citizens, cycles, dowries, subsidised groceries, idlis, etc. That’s their problem, not ours. Since they’re both chummy with the Dear Leader, I’m guessing that the Centre may eventually have to foot the bills in return for the ladies allowing the passage of contentious Bills in Parliament.
But, hey, I’m not trashing Amma and Didi for two very good reasons. For one, with inflation and high taxation slashing my meagre savings, I may have to prostrate myself at Amma’s feet like her party members frequently do (which is perhaps why they don’t go in for bariatric surgery like BJP party members) and beg for affordable idlis and sambar too. She’s lovely to people who bow and scrape. Ingratiating myself with Didi won’t be so easy, though. I’d have to burn a CPI(M) office or two or even beat up a few Lefties to prove that I’m not a Maoist, and I don’t think I can stomach violence of any kind.
The other reason is that there’s a good chance either of them may become India’s next prime minister, and I say this with feeling: any party is a better option than the BJP! That both Amma and Didi are authoritarian does not put me off one bit: the Dear Leader has already given us a dose of the repressive Gujarat model, and after that anything in comparison would feel like freedom. It would be fantastic to see the ABVP (BJP’s young bigots-in-waiting wing) get a taste of their own ghastly medicine.
As for secularism and pluralism (the BJP’s least favourite words), I don’t know too much about Amma, but Didi certainly makes a grand show of delivering. Well, she’s learnt that it is her only strong card – after she left the NDA many years ago, of course (oh dear, I’ve let out another of her little secrets).Given a choice between the two as India’s next prime minister, I’d probably choose Didi. Mainly because I would love to hear the strains of Rabindra Sangeet drown out the sounds of YoYo Honey Singh on Delhi’s streets. It’s settled then. Didi for next prime minister, okay?

Tuesday, January 5, 2016

Two middle-aged leddies going to the Dalli to do middle-aged leddies things. Pick up husband's jacket, buy practical undies, and other mind-numbingly boring chores. I never thought it would come to this.*Blush*
Well, on the upside, at least we can see for ourselves how Kejriwal's odd-even plan is doing. I'm beginning to admire Kejriwal's balls. Not just the odd-even thingie but his ads. He's found a way around the SC's ruling that chief ministers cannot feature in ads -- the sneaky guy has got himself shot from the back so there is no face, just his trademark muffler and pullover.
Ballsy, out-of-the-box thinking, dude!